The Curious Case of Bebe Fyfe

Fabulous Babulous…. sunbeaming again.

Most folks who visit the Fyfe Farm haven’t met Bebe, our mysterious feline companion. If she hears that doorbell ring or a voice in the house she disappears like magic and we won’t see her for at least 2 hours.

If the house guests are spending the night I won’t see her until its time for soft food when the guest room door is closed before bed. I don’t know where she re-appears from. Sometimes the garage, sometimes the boat, sometimes from behind the washing machine.

She’s been that way ever since Whitney and her friend brought her and her littermate, Cartman home in Bismarck. I had only told the kids about the litter of kittens down the road so they would slow down with their driving. Not because we needed 2 more cats.

Bebe as a kitten

When Babs and Cartman joined us that brought our indoor collection of cats to 8, which is totally ridiculous and I think it might be partly why she is as shy as she is.

When you’re the youngest sibling in a household of older, well established sibs you probably don’t need to communicate much. Or interact, other than for basic necessities like eating & using the litter box.

Over the years she slowly packed on some weight and she just did her own thing.

She, like every other female Fyfe adored our big boy, Oscar, who was basically the king of the cats.

Cooper, Boomer and Bebe snuggled in with Oscar

It wasn’t unusual to find any combination of the girls with him in one of the cat beds scattered throughout the house.

This went on for years.

Until we lost Oscar.

That was the beginning of the change in feline dynamics around here because Mulder was suddenly in charge. Until we lost him, too.

You can imagine the dynamics when there are this many of you! And you can’t even see Sport and Cooper!

And everything changed as Attrition continued until, as of February, we had a house with 2 indoor cats and Babs is one of them.

Which is when we got to meet the real Bebe Fyfe.

Our quiet, not-so-little fan of sunbeams and soft food has become a Domesticated Indoor Cat.

Shy, young Bebe many years ago

She meows at me to remind me that our morning routine has changed.

On top of letting the dogs out, feeding the dogs, cleaning the litter box, feeding Loki, getting Rimadyl for Loki, changing the water in the water dish, getting water to Luigi, and giving treats to Luigi as I clean his cage, I now have to give 3 Greenies treats to a somewhat demanding grey & white Domesticated Indoor Cat.

I mean, she’s cute about it but when did this all start? I didn’t even know she could meow!

Bebe now comes down to our bedroom on sleep-in mornings if we’re lazily watching Netflix while sipping our Kona coffee and joins us.

On. The. Bed.

“What?”

And she purrs and cuddles and interacts as if she’s been a normal cat all of her life.

She’s also lost some weight, probably due to being more active around the house and outside as well. She’s much smaller than she was in the photo above, which was taken just after we lost Boomer in February.

Boomer and Bebe always cuddled in the cat beds but there must have been something about her that kept our strange little Bebe quiet all those years.

Bebe’s sole pastime for years (aside from sunbeaming) was staring at our freezers in the garage. When I had my clinic that’s where I would sadly bring home patients we’d lost who were going in for cremation. Bebe would make the strangest chirping sounds and tip her head from side to side while staring at the freezer. We just figured she was communicating with the spirits and we’ve been fine with that.

“You don’t want me to exercise, do you?”

I don’t see her staring at the freezer much any more.

Maybe she was communicating with the spirits who were likely a bit confused about their situation. I know that every paw of every pet that I have held while they transitioned with their families by their side was ready to lay down and have a good, long nap. They may not have put that thought together but I have only ever said goodbye when it was necessary.

Never out of convenience.

I used to think that was an endearing quality that Bebe had and really, she did it with such regularity it was almost a bit freakish.

But it doesn’t happen now & that’s not because our freezer is empty. Mouse, Boomer, Calypso & Phillipa sadly are beneath Alistair’s treasured huckleberries right now. I think Bebe just knows that they understand where they are and their spirits are still right at home.

Bebe & Sport waiting for Mummy to open the kitchen door a few days ago.

And her own spirit is blossoming as she grows into the Domesticated Indoor Cat that she is becoming.

And we like her chirping and meowing and visiting us throughout the house. I like seeing her and Loki sleeping closer and closer together on the bed. I love the feel of her clawless paws as she kneads my lap when she explores the land of lap-sitting. I like feeding her bits of bacon on sleep-in mornings although I suspect we won’t ever get to the Kiss Piece stage of domestication.

Its fun watching her explore our house- the living room with the warm wood stove and the snoring Boston Terrier snoozing in front of it; our bedroom with all of its windows and the big TV she likes to stare at; the computer room where I do all of my creating and Loki sleeps on my feet like she is now; and the outdoor world where she has even brought a couple of mice up that big old plank.

And I love sharing Fabulous Babulous with all of you!

Just another day in a cat bed with Cooper & Oscar and Boomer wondering where she was going to fit.

“Pleased to meet you, Jacques. I’m Bebe. Don’t chase me, okay?”

The ultimate Sunbeamer.

Just now, refusing to look at the camera. Oh, Bebe!

The Golden Girls

Beautiful Montana

I have been absent from the blogosphere for a few weeks.

It wasn’t my intention. Its just that its Summer in western Montana and we try to pack as much as we can into our window of warmth.

Spring can be wet and Fall can be cold. And if you’ve followed my blog or you also live here then you know what Winter can be.

But Summer…

Juicy mountain goodness in a bowl.

Montana huckleberries are famous for their vibrant hues and sweet juiciness. Most folks around here have their own secret stash they like to pick from. Our stash last year never fully ripened, at least not enough to spend the time to go out and pick.

The stash more than made up for it this year.

We never like to overdo it- the thought that I’m taking food from the local bears keeps us grounded in that regard. But we spent a couple of hours in the sun and got enough for our huckleberry pancakes Alistair enjoys so much.

This year’s bounty, measured in baggies for pancakes this year.

We also made time to get the canoe out, which we didn’t do once last year.

There is a quiet little lake near our home. There isn’t really any beach to speak of and the campsite is very small, not to mention its a ways off the beaten path so there’s usually only a few folks out there which makes for a peaceful, enjoyable paddle.

Best view for miles around.

We paddled and floated on Lake Upsata and enjoyed the beauty around us.

We listened to the light waves lap and bump up against our Kevlar sides.

We heard the loons call out in between their full-body dives as they searched for the fish that continue to elude us.

And we laughed and reminisced about our last time canoeing with our good friend, Paul on the local canoe trail, where we bottomed out a few times thanks to late season low water and 3 adults on board.

Peaceful Lake Upsata.

Alistair didn’t end up catching anything as the skies towards us were darkening and clouds formed into threatening shapes and colors. The kinds of shapes you shouldn’t be beneath on a body of water.

Hmmmm… maybe we should think about heading in?

But Alistair is back to work in North Dakota and I’m back to my routine at home.

I have realized that my relationship with some of my non-human roommates has become something like the old TV show, the Golden Girls. Me, Loki, Cleo and Phillipa.

Loki is Bea Arthur’s character, Dorothy. While sometimes grumpy and bossy she is still a lovable, sweet, reliable friend with a gravelly voice and a sense of humor.

Loki loves making nests out of clothes to snuggle up in.

Cleopatra is Blanche, who was played by Rue McLanahan. They are both stunning mature women with charming southern accents and an uncanny way of flirting with and attracting men.

Cleopatra Cassiopia Carrie Bradshaw Houdini Diamond Fyfe… charmed, I’m sure.

Phillipa is Sophia, Dorothy’s mother, who was played by Estelle Getty. The littlest member of the gang with a feisty attitude and a penchant for teasing others, she is one of our resident thieves with a passion for footwear.

Bonjour, mes ami!

Which leaves me as Betty White’s somewhat naïve, honest animal lover, Rose. I’m not from the Midwest but I sometimes ramble on about days gone by and quirky stories from my past.

Me… the Betty White of our group.

I’ve been noticing changes. Subtle changes, in some cases, and more noticeable in others.

Phillipa and Loki are both losing weight.

Its more rapid in Phillipa’s case but then everything is more rapid when you’re a ferret. If you consider the fact that one month is akin to one year for a ferret in terms of how their bodies age and change then things are going to happen faster.

Phillipa & I post-bath a couple of years ago.

She’s also become quite picky about her chewy treats, only eating the raisin or peanut butter ones while younger Luigi gobbles up the chicken, banana and bacon ones. And she’s eating them slower. Antibiotics didn’t change anything but I am continuing with a daily anti-inflammatory. At the age of 7 I’m certain there is some arthritis in her teensy body.

Loki’s weight loss is happening despite a ravenous appetite. I love seeing her eat or watch her bash the empty food dish around the kitchen to get my attention.

“Snoooooooore”

Both girls seem to feel great, though, continuing to romp around in Phillipa’s case and enjoying long walk & talk sessions outside when it comes to Loki. They are both getting more grey and they’re both sleeping longer but they are eating, drinking, peeing, pooping and playing normally so I’m content with that.

And Cleo gave us a scare in April.

Our Southern Belle developed a head tilt, body leaning, stumbling, falling-over-when-she-sneezed condition that included a vertical nystagmus for 2 days. That’s where your eyes flicker non-stop left and right. Go figure she was wobbly.

During her tilt-to-the-left phase en route to Bismarck.

The nystagmus ended but the leaning to the left remained, which was why I brought them all to Bismarck with me. It was right on the heels of losing Calypso and it came out of nowhere so I figured a brain tumor was the only answer.

So Cleo leaned against the walls in Bismarck and toppled over to the left if she tried to stand up and she fell getting off the bed and we got Jessi, Lynn, Cindy and Debbie crying when I told them and I didn’t tell everyone because I honestly wasn’t prepared for it and it was so sad seeing her fall over as she shook herself and I held her and she laid a lot more than normal with me and I told her all of the things I could think of that needed to be said.

Also during the time of the tilt, in Bismarck

That we loved her. That she was a wonderful big sister and companion. That UPS-Matt and Fireman Frank loved her. That it was a magical day when she came home from the clinic I worked at, having been brought in to be put to sleep for being aggressive back in 2005.

That I wouldn’t let her suffer and if she showed me any indication of that I would do what had to be done.

But I didn’t have to.

Not yet.

Cleo’s classic “Square Face” look at one of our Dog Days of Summer years ago

After twice daily anti-inflammatories (which she is still on) she recovered completely. Running, jumping, leaping, standing, walking on her back legs, playing, swimming, loving, cuddling- Cleo is back.

And each day is a gift.

So maybe my tears right now are for my feelings back in April and May and they’ve moved from Cleopatra onto Phillipa and Loki.

Alistair with Loki, UB and Cleo last summer in Bismarck.

I wonder if this is what its like to be a resident in a senior’s home.

Where you make friendships and develop strong bonds to people who are all at a point in life where the number of days ahead are far fewer than those in the rear-view mirror.

Where anything can happen and, really, can it be much of a surprise?

I’m the only Golden Girl who hasn’t met or surpassed her expiration date. Loki is 16. Phillipa is 7. Cleo is at least 12.

The 4 of us have a bunch more grey hair (Cleo has the least) and we’re pretty set in our ways of routines and schedules.

Luigi, Phillipa and I this spring. Clever hats to disguise the grey!

Maybe Cleo has what we call Old Dog Vestibular Disease. There is no test for that but it can come and go. We’ll enjoy it while its gone.

And we’ll enjoy the seasons as they change and remark on the similarities to our own lives. To every thing, indeed.

We’ll just continue to love and live our routines and enjoy each day with one another. With Phillipa sneaking up on blind Loki to nibble at her feet. With Cleo and Loki and UB snuggling up together in bed at night. With Loki pin-balling her way through the house. With soft food, chicken mozzarella, accents and berets and with cute voices talking to us while we play golf and shoes and insoles that go missing on a nightly basis and with nail trims, Rimadyl and Metacam and Walk & Talks with Step Gammy, Fyfe Life will continue as always.

Alistair, Calypso, Phillipa & Luigi this past winter.

It is a good Summer.

As good as we can for as long as we can.

I’ll keep you posted. xo

Several years ago when Phillipa (mistakenly known as Phillipe back then, oops) joined our family!

Cleo, the summer she came home, bonded immediately to her Daddy.

Very young Loki with very young Casey many moons ago.

3 out of 4 Golden Fyfe Girls with UB this spring.

Deconstructing Eden

Fyfe Summer Project has begun!

We thought about it.

We procrastinated.

We made plans.

We got thinking a bit more and weathered one more winter and finally we started.

We are making some big, fun changes. Changes that will, hopefully, open up more outdoor living space and create an engaging, relaxing, serene environment where we will want to spend mornings with coffee or watch the colors of the sky as the sun sets, martinis in-hand.

Changes that will eliminate this.

2014. Another winter where I bonded with the shovel.

Every winter I have posted pathetic pictures of my woe-is-me moments where the snow from the roof has landed on the deck. The deck I had likely just shoveled the day/night before (and posted pictures of.)

The snow from the deck would encroach on the hot tub as well as the lower windows of our glass solarium into our kitchen.

A couple of hours later.

We removed the railings from the deck a few years ago because it was difficult for little Me to heave the heavy shovel loads overtop. But then I faced the probem where I truly would run out of places to put said snow.

Until hubby would return to Montana to move the snow big-boy style.

Big Boy Snow Removal System

And the cycle would repeat itself.

Over and over again.

And, yes, we have a walking snow-blower, which is great for the lower decks but little Me was never able to get its heavy ass up to this deck on my own.

2013. Same deal.

And my friends would chuckle and laugh or maybe they would shake their heads wondering just how many times I would post these pictures and lament over the task at hand.

The “after” pic back then.

We aren’t deconstructing Eden because of the snow load, however. It is more about what the repeated dumpings have done to the deck.

Our friend, who had this home built several years ago swore up & down that the deck was designed for western Montana snowfall when we first mentioned the sagging areas and boards pulling away from the walls.

That the enormous deck was an entertainment living space that highlighted the back of the house and should survive any test of time.

UB helping Daddy as we got going a few days ago.

It turns out our friend was misled.

And he likely paid a whole bunch of money to be misled.

That doesn’t look right…

Once a few deck planks came up it was revealed why things had sagged.

We found one beam.

One.

Supporting that entire deck, this one, hapless, cracked beam.

And the beam didn’t run the length of this portion of the deck.

What happens when a beam breaks.

While a deck this size should have had a dozen cement slabs with support beams, this uncovered area only had 4. And its pretty clear they weren’t being used.

The 2 other cement slabs with their support posts clearly not doing their job!

The support stands were just laying there. No Rebar, no brackets, no beams, nothing.

We began finding more and more evidence of incredibly shoddy and dangerous workmanship.

No support from below leads to this kind of mess.

Even at the ends of the deck things were mostly supported from above, which makes no sense unless the workers were in an absolute rush. Or they were stupid. Maybe both.

Its the most Mickey Mouse way of doing construction you can imagine.

As if the contractor said, “hey, Crew, lets do the shittiest job we can on this!”

The Cement forms.

The 4 cement forms (which weren’t being used) were not thick enough to provide the right amount of support. And 2 of them were mostly rocks, making the actual cement base less than a centimeter in some parts!

Rocks throughout.

That particular form fell apart in my hands.

Jockey, UB and Cleo watched and played as Daddy and I worked. Alistair did the lion’s share of manly, heavy, crow-bar type of work and I carted wood or stabilized shaky railings. At one point I lifted an entire beam off the deck it was “attached” to.

Jockey. Helping.

And I took the occasional break to see how the rest of Eden was doing while letting Loki out for Walks with Step Gammy.

The flowers are lovely. We have never had a lilac bloom outside of our bedroom bathroom like we are having this year. The entire house smells of lilacs when the windows are open and it is heavenly.

ahhhhhhh…. (if you like lilacs)

Our new hanging plants are so pretty (thank-you, Alistair!) and the bushes that have survived my shoving loads of snow on top of them over several years are blooming.

Hello, pretty thing!

Why haven’t we had these before? They’re lovely!

And then we were back to cracking jokes in UB’s voice about the deck and pulling and pushing and crow-barring and heaving and hauling, shaking our heads and wondering what the contractors were thinking and reverse drilling while doing the Michael Westin thing from Burn Notice at the beginning of every episode but changing it up to suit the moment:

“My name is UB Fyfe. I used to be a Deck Deconstruction expert.” (Jut your lower jaw out and lower your voice and you’ve nailed it.)

And just like that (well, it was several hours and a lot of glasses of water), that side of the deck is gone.

Almost all gone at this point. Watch that kitchen door… first step is a doozy!

And most of the wood is gone! A happy local family who used to bring me all of their wonderful pets over the years hauled most of it off this afternoon. I posted it free, to a good home last night and got a ton of hits! Who knew?

The decking… all gone!

We will hopefully begin Reconstruction this summer, at least putting in some stairs. We have plans for an outdoor living space but we aren’t sure how far we’ll get this season. We might have to see how easy it is to remove snow with the tractor and snowblower first.

We also have the other side of the deck to tackle but that, too, might take another season.

Gee, I wonder what we’ll find underneath that sagging portion?

So if your plans for the summer included a visit to Fyfe Land, you might be put to work. Or you might not. The hot tub and tiki torches may be as far as we get.

I won’t miss this…

I have missed this, however. Good old Casey watching Mummy shovel the decks from behind a snowpile (2014)

Loki helping me inspect the flowers yesterday.

R.E. Phase I is complete.

What’s Up, Docs?

Luigi and Phillipa helped me make a fun little bling-video

If you ask me what’s new or going on or how we’re doing these days I might pause for a few seconds before I answer.

I’m just trying to remember where I am.

After Alistair’s surgery to remove hardware from his pelvis on May 6th we returned to Montana to begin his slow recovery.

Short hikes out back… found some back-up body parts for Alistair!

Somehow I managed to keep his activity to a minimum and the healing process has gone well. The main thing is that the pain from the migrating pins is gone so the surgery was a success! The recovery phase now is the soft tissue healing.

Cleopatra had other ideas for the spare parts.

But we still had to get back to Bismarck to tend to our horse herd and our garden so we loaded up the 3 dogs and hit the road for the 11 hour drive yet again.

We abandoned the cages and brought the “Magic Blanket” instead and the dogs travelled beautifully, even if Miss Cleo was a little bit dramatic about the whole thing.

Drama Queen

Highway 200 is a sparsely-populated trek across the plains. We often encounter enormous farm machinery or equipment being hauled on equally ginormous rigs and we don’t see many other travelers.

Which is probably why you can still have a bona-fide cattle drive taking up the road!

No joke! Cattle Drive!

The moo-ing and occasional “yip” from the cowboys (riding ATVs, not horses) was old school Montana but hey, when you have to move the herd several miles down the road what else are you going to do?

We finally got by them (moo!) and made it back to our own herd in sunny North Dakota.

Our beautiful bunch a couple of summers ago.

Its where we had a nest full of new neighbors and a slightly peeved Mother!

This year’s nest built right on top of last year’s.

The nest appeared last summer and a new one was built on top this year. Its location is cleverly tucked away from the winds that blow constantly but not so clever in that its immediately outside of our front door.

The adult robin continued to bring worms up and we tried to make an effort to use the side door through the garage when we could.

Closer view of the new kids on the block.

The babies grew and grew and the day after I took this photo they were out of the nest, flying around on their own. They hovered near the area but we never saw them in the nest again and another cycle of nature has been completed.

Bismarck is also where we got our garden up & running.

Its a large garden that Alistair has tweaked over the years. This was the first year I was there to help get everything in the ground.

Grow, my pretties, grow.

5 types of potatoes, 8 different tomato plants, 8 each of cauliflower, spinach and broccoli, red and yellow onions, herbsherbsherbs, pumpkin, cucumbers, squash varieties and 3 types of corn.

YUM!

The only thing now is hoping that the North Dakota winds don’t destroy things like they did after the first planting last year.

Hang in there, Troops!

Our farm is also where we had to take care of a few equine-related things.

Vaccinations. Deworming.

Combing out tangled manes and tails and moving pastures.

And saying goodbye.

We laid Brutus and Raven to rest on the same day and even though we both knew it had to be done it still hit me harder than I thought it would.

Brutus in March this year.

Brutus, a bay Paint gelding we raised had injured himself years ago at a trainer’s and could never be ridden. His labored mobility had become difficult to watch and with a new worsening respiratory condition this spring we laid him to rest on the farm he was born on.

Last June, Brutus is in the very center.

And then there was Raven.

A Fyfe Farm staple and Boss Mare for almost as long as I have known Alistair.

We bought her as a yearling in 1995 at a reduced price because of a hoof injury she had sustained that made her an un-rideable well-bred American Paint Horse broodmare.

Raven and baby Shilo just a day or two old.

She produced some gentle, gorgeous, personality-laden foals over the years and was an exceptional Mama.

Raven never minded us being right in with her and the foals and each one has been fun and relatively easy to work with.

Shilo goofing around with Alistair with Raven right there.

Shilo, a little bit older, still enjoying being played with.

While she always had that misshapen rear hoof it never bothered her over the years. She really had a great life for a horse.

Never had a saddle on her.

Always top quality hay and big pastures to run around.

She had the herd’s respect.

And three of her foals stayed on the farm and became part of the herd.

The ladies & their foals, they were the Magnificent Seven that spring. (Raven in the center with Shilo).

Last September we noticed a forelimb lameness that suddenly appeared. It didn’t go away. In fact, it got worse. During my trips back to Bismarck it became clear that she was struggling to get around and was dropping her weight and not shedding out well. One of the easiest keepers of the herd was starting to look tough.

Shilo and Raven last June, clearly thriving.

So it was Time.

Raven sedated calmly near the rest of the herd before Alistair slowly led her to the area where we had buried Brutus just a couple of hours beforehand and she let me rub her a little before I gave her an intra-venous boat load of tranquilizers and she got stoned and wobbly and kept eating the rich, thick grass in front of her and then I injected the pink solution and I kissed her one last time.

And I choked up walking away as Alistair climbed up into the tractor again that day.

Raven and Frankie, who grew to be the tallest horse on the farm.

The herd dynamic definitely changed that day. When we did vaccinations and deworming of the remaining 13, having to separate them in small groups, they all seemed more anxious and worked up to be apart from each other.

They whinnied, they nickered, they kicked up and ran around.

And now 2 are coming back to Montana this week with Alistair and UB because its time to get the pasture here gobbled up and hopefully it will be time for some riding.

Most of the remaining herd.

And Alistair is healing, having good days and great days and Loki and Cleo are so tight with me its becoming difficult to walk around the house and I think that’s enough driving and uncertainty for awhile and I’m not sad because of what we had to do, I’m just sad because everyone and everything keeps getting older and I’m sad they are gone even though its the circle of life and everything has a cycle and I know that our second year of Attrition hasn’t been any easier than the first but I also know that’s how it goes and I’ll be damned if I bottle it up and develop Compassion Fatigue.

Mother Nature wants us to have apples this year.

And there are so many wonderful things going on that make me want to smile right now. Happy Hubby. Garden. Loki (sleeping on my foot right now). Rain. Springtime.

While things occur that make me feel sad I’m still very happy, even if I have to pause when you ask how things are going. My head and heart have been kind of full lately.

Its what it is.

Its what’s up.

UB, Cleo & I at our favorite rest stop along highway 200.

Our blind little wonder heading out on her own trek at the rest stop.

Many moons ago with Raven & Shilo (Katie in the background).

Big Frankie and his mom.

Certain Uncertainties

The no-shouldered, uneven, lonely highway 200 across Montana

Two things in my life have remained true:

My life changes with every phone call, and
It is foolish to write my address in anything but a pencil.

The most recent example of #1 has been the past few weeks. Normally I’m one of those people who likes to have things planned well in advance.

I like to have schedules and lists. I like to know where I’m going if I’m going anywhere and how long I’ll be there. I like planning what to bring or who to bring and what to tell people in charge of who I didn’t bring to expect.

I brought these two.

It might sound a bit uptight but really, its just being organized.

I can be spur-of the-moment if the situation calls for it.

Like the road trip to Banff with Anna and Shelley in the middle of the night years ago.

Or the climb up the world’s third-largest Ferris Wheel in southern Japan without considering how frightening the trip back down would be.

Kind of like my cruise across the Big Sky state of Montana just over a week ago with my 3 traveling companions and a great selection of cds.

“Don’t forget me, Step Gammy!”

Our amazing house/pet caretaker, Jessi was available on a moment’s notice and I loaded golf clubs, a variety of golf shoes, hats & sparkly ball-markers, bling, dry dog food, canned dog food, dog meds, dressy clothes, normal clothes, farm clothes, and the dogs and myself into the 3/4 ton Ram and we were off on another adventure to Bismarck.

We were off to see Alistair/Daddy/Gampy.

Who was Gimpy Gampy again.

Gimpy Gampy in 2012 pre-op with my other patient… the beginning of the eyeball nightmares for Loki.

He wasn’t the version of himself that required surgery and hardware to stop bleeding and put his broken pieces back together but he was Gimpy Gampy this time because of the hardware.

This hardware. (Well, not the big screw… that sucker only lasted a few months).

The pins had all broken and some had begun to migrate. We knew this from x-rays he had taken over time and although they occasionally caused irritation they hadn’t really bothered him until the past few months.

It became unpredictably unbearable 2 weeks ago so it was time to see if something could be done.

A new surgeon on the case in Fargo saw him last Monday and booked surgery for Thursday.

Hanging out on the farm, wondering what each day would bring.

I’m not used to saying to people, “I have absolutely no clue what we are doing tomorrow.”

It doesn’t work for me and I obsess about little things and I don’t sleep well.

And yet, that’s just how it had to be.

Pretty Fumie.

Off to Fargo on Wednesday night (2 1/2 hours east of Bismarck) with a new pet caretaker staying at the house with the 3 dogs. We slowly explored the downtown core of the city which is rich in cafes and colorful people and we enjoyed a lovely Italian meal a block from our hotel.

We made it to the 5am check-in and he was whisked off for surgery a couple of hours later.

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Laughing and joking with the nurses in pre-op. Its how we do things.

And the plate and most of the pins are gone! And, happily, so is a lot of the discomfort and unpredictable pain! He’s moving slowly right now and he’s pretty stiff and sore but we are hoping this has done the trick.

And the dogs and I drove through thick brown smoke yesterday for the 10 1/2 trip to get back to the farm because Jessi’s husband is deploying again and she needed to fly to California.

The smoke is from the devastating wildfire burning up much of Alberta, Canada right now. As dual-citizens we both focus on Canadian news as much as the American stories happening but this fire had me glued to my iPad in the Fargo hospital.

This didn’t capture the smoky haze everywhere. It did capture a lot of dead bugs…

Unusually warm weather and not a lot of snowpack in a dense Borreal forest have made this a nightmare for over 90,000 evacuees, many of whom have no home to return to.

No neighborhood.

No photograph albums.

No clothes-in-the-closet.

No bikes, no dog food, no TV, no driveway, no patio, no hot tub, no community, no power, and likely no job.

And I bitch about the unpredictability in my life?

Coming home.

I contemplated not going in for groceries because I hadn’t brought sandals to Bismarck, not figuring on the heat wave, so I had to wear my heavy Dr.Martens with socks.

Gasp!

Unfathomable!

I did it, though. I compensated with fabulous bling.

At least I have shoes. And sandals. And I know where to find them and I know what my next meal is and I’ll sleep in my comfy bed tonight with my ridiculously tight canine companions in my beautiful meadow of a neighborhood and I can choose to play golf tomorrow or not.

But those people in Alberta aren’t so lucky.

I’m doing an online fundraiser with my bling biz. Anything you buy, I get 40% commissions on and I’m donating 100% of that to the Canadian Red Cross. Its not going to be much but its something.

Maybe its a bag of dog or cat food.

Maybe its a box of diapers.

Maybe its a hot breakfast for a family who woke up in strange beds in a strange shelter in a smoke-filled world surrounded by others suffering the same fate.

(Fundraiser link is http://www.chloeandisabel.com/boutique/tanyafyfe/48e527).

The 4 of us in Bismarck.

So I’ll shut up about my little anxieties in my perfect, love-filled, accessorized, sparkly world.

And hopefully Alistair will be back to Montana soon and maybe things will slowly get back to what our version of Normal is.

Maybe.

UB comforting me as Daddy kicked my butt at crib one day post-op!

Cleo enjoying the sun in Bismarck at her old farm!

We played a round at Painted Woods before surgery and this is the closest I have EVER come to a hole-in-one!!!! Made the birdie. Ball for the wall.

Buckle Up!

Loki, Cleopatra and UB got to go on another adventure with Mummy a couple of weeks ago when they joined me in our 3/4 ton Dodge Ram and headed out east to spend a few days with Daddy!

Dog is my co-pilot!

Loki, who has always been an excellent traveler got to ride shotgun in the cab with me.

Which means she also got to listen to me sing along to my 80’s and 90’s musical selections I chose for this trip.

(I also had brand new Coldplay, which I highly recommend and am deeply addicted to but most of the musical journey was more nostalgic than that).

Ahhhh….

There is nothing like belting out ‘Hey, Jealousy’ under clear blue skies on an open road headed straight towards North Dakota.

And I was doing fine with Loki until I got going with Vertical Horizon. For whatever reason, as I was lamenting along with the lead singer about “grey sky mornings”, Loki cocked her head up at me and I swear she sneered.

Which isn’t really very obvious because of her squished-in Boston Terrier face and her accompanying harelip but I’m pretty sure I got a look.

And yet she was fine with Matchbox 20. Go figure!

Music has been and always will be a huge part of my life. I usually have some sort of soundtrack running through my head and at times I’m choreographing figure skating or dance moves in my mind. (As a note, this can be dangerous when you are on a treadmill and you start to add physical movements imagining you’re on Dancing With the Stars. Maybe you already know that. I’m sure its quite common…)

But I digress.

I’m sure my love of music and movement to it stems from spending so much time in ice rinks doing just that. I loved making up routines to everyone else’s music which may have annoyed my coaches early on but led to requests for my choreographic skills later on.

Skater Girl! Loved that dress!

I love listening to lyrics and trying to figure out what the singers are trying to tell me. I’m curious if the song has any real meaning or if its just a catchy beat. I like introspective writing with music but I also enjoy songs about loving the mountains, the ocean and nature itself.

John Denver was a master at that. A lot of Canadian singers and bands do a good job of that, too.

I also am enjoying how my perspective has changed the more years I’m on this planet towards particular songs or styles.

Classics!

I finally got some of Sting’s songs that he wrote after his father died many years ago.Or, I think I got them. What I originally thought were songs penned for unrequited or lost love, I actually now think were for his father.

“Why should I cry for you?”

Great question! I don’t know if he had the greatest relationship with his Pops or the Catholic church but I wonder. The song, All This Time is catchy and perky and radio friendly but the more I listened (and repeated, sorry, Loki) the more I heard about a boy’s father dying and a whole whack of Catholic images.

Music plays a big role in the books I write more for myself than my characters.

None of the characters in Missing Lake are figure skaters and the songs they analyze are given to them by their English Teacher.

The books are another part of the reason I loaded UB and Cleo into crates in the enclosed back of my pickup and traveled east. My second book signing in Watford City finally took place!

Books & Bling sold at the uber funky Door 204 where I got to see some great friends, Brenda, Marna and Zack!

I combined it with my Chloe & Isabel bling and we had a heck of a good time at a cute new coffee shop in the former teensy town that almost burst its seams in the middle of the oil patch a few years ago.

My friend, Wendy joined me for the 2 1/2 hour drive (dogs stayed in Bismarck this time) and we had a wonderful time seeing so many of our friends from the years in the early 90s when we both lived there.

So much has changed.

I’m not a 21 year-old professional figure skater with a long, curly pony-tail shacked up with the new doc in town who was just a few years older.

Getting to speak to an auditorium full of students about accomplishments and challenges and plain old writing!

I’m not a one-dog, one-cat and one-ferret young Canadian with only a student visa and no hope in sight of getting a Green Card.

I’m not the step-mom of 2 cute, blonde little Canadian kids sitting at lunch with them and their friends or volunteering for track meets, watching them play softball, baking endless dozens of cookies, helping them do homework and taking them to swimming lessons or hosting Hallowe’en parties, or crafting Happy Parties for them to break through the grey skies and cold winds of a North Dakota winter.

Our one & only Happy Party out at our farm. It was epic!

Our friends in Watford City have watched me become so many different things and while many changes have been huge our friendships have remained. I felt so lucky and loved the day we were back there and wish it could have been for longer.

Alistair and I also had things to address back on our farm in Bismarck.

some of the herd in Bismarck

Like the horses.

They, like every other animal on the Fyfe Farm are aging and some decisions are going to have to be made.

It was good for me to see the changes he has told me about all winter and to watch how the herd moved.

To see the older mare who used to run the herd looking weedy and standing off by herself with my own eyes.

She’s not sick, she’s just old. When older horses start losing weight it can turn into a rapid deal.

Cassie and Penner. Not on The List!

Counseling clients on end-of-life decisions with horses is different than with smaller companion animals in some respects. I often ask what the rest of the herd would do with a particular horse in question.

Would they form a circle around them to protect them like many herds do with young foals? Or would the herd move on, aware that the older or wounded individual was slowing them down, making them all easier targets for prey animals?

I believe, with this particular mare, the herd has moved on.

Flash, Jessie and Fumie… not on The List and obviously not suffering!

Decisions were made but nothing needed to be done just yet so we got to enjoy our time together with the dogs back in Bismarck. We tried new restaurants and enjoyed old favorites. We sat with the 3 dogs in our 2 recliners sipping wine or martinis at night. Alistair chipped golf balls and we hot tubbed under a gorgeous blanket of stars each night.

We went to his clinic’s Christmas party and even though I must have missed the ‘casual attire’ memo we both looked and felt great.

And then it was time to load up 2 vehicles with boxes of books, bling, golf clubs, fancy shoes and fancy dresses, jackets and dogs.

Rest area along hwy 200 with an enclosed dog area! Brilliant!

The trip back was much easier handling the 3 dogs with Alistair there to help.

I am sure I was a spectacle on my own trying to manage blind Loki and the other 2 wrapped around my legs or each other at the rest stops. Cleo and UB used to have leash manners but living in the middle of nowhere with an entire forest or 40 acres of prairie for a back yard we’ve let that training lapse.

Loki didn’t seem to mind my singing as she nestled into her magic blanket in the front seat for the 11 hour journey back to Montana.

Following the Jetta through sleepy towns like Jordan along hwy 200.

And now we’re back and we had snow for 3 days which Loki wasn’t impressed with.

We have enjoyed it, though, getting out on snowshoes and the snowmobiles.

And throughout all of this our household has changed once again, which is one more reason I needed to go away to Bismarck to be with Alistair for a few days.

I’m not ready to write about this one because it broke my heart even though it wasn’t a surprise and I was alone except for 3 friends on Facebook and Alistair on the phone helping me through a very difficult act and my subsequent grief.

Heading west, coming back to Montana, which was different yet again.

But that’s for another time.

There were so many reasons for me to load up the truck with so much stuff and 3 special spirits and I am so glad to have had the chance to once again go to our other home. The drive is long but if the companions are fun and the weather is great and the music is just right the journeys can be pretty special.

For the books. The bling. The Christmas party. The horses. The decisions. And the need to be away and the need to come back to another new normal with my support group around me.

Packing up after a rest stop break between Circle & Jordan, MT.

“Please don’t play the ABBA cd, Step-Gammy!”

Snowshoe fun back in Montana!

Fyfe Characters

Trying to take pictures with good old Casey a few years ago

I got to thinking about our crazy animal companions the other day and I didn’t get melancholy over the losses that have seemed never ending the past year & a half.

I could have easily slipped into a dark sadness but I started remembering how absolutely goofy some of them were, and some of the silly situations they got themselves into and I started smiling. And laughing. And I thought it would be fun to share some of the stories about pets who are still here and pets who are gone and hopefully you will get a chuckle out of them, too.

Bonjour. Did you call for me?

Like Jacques. Our black-eyed white ferret.

Ferrets like to hide and they can disappear into tiny spaces and crevices just about anywhere. If they can fit their head into or under something then they can generally get their bodies in. And they can climb, too, the little acrobats.

We would lose Jacques for hours, calling & calling for him. He often would appear from our bedroom but we couldn’t find out where he was hiding.

Until, for some reason, I pulled out a drawer beneath shelves in my closet.

How Jacques slept amongst the sequins, spandex and fish nets!

He had to climb straight up to get himself into a large bin where the duds of my day as a figure skater/show girl now reside. Fishnet stockings, sequins, bangles, beads, wrap-around skirts and show costumes and there’s little Jacques curled up within it all. Sometimes he was buried and other times he was just chillaxin’. In the spandex.

After that we affectionately called him Jacques Brian Boitano Fyfe.

And where does one begin with Casey’s stories?

Casey always was up for a snuggle, preferably on your lap.

My vet school friend drove him from Saskatoon down to Bismarck when he had finished his PT after his year of being rebuilt at our vet school. Theresa had kindly fostered him for us and happily came for a visit. Minutes before they reached the US border Casey puked all over her. That was too bad given the fact the border guard apparently was pretty hot and Theresa was single back then.

Good old Casey.

One of many, many body parts Casey dragged home over the years.

Casey loved Montana. (Who am I kidding? Casey loved EVERYthing!)

Our back yard borders USFS so there are miles and miles of forest. The dogs all treated it as their own little kingdom.

One time, early on, Casey & Harry didn’t come back from a hike they had joined me on. We called and called into the trees and Harry eventually did return. We called all of our new neighbors, the restaurant that used to be here, the pet shelter in town… nothing.

Until a few hours later when a Subaru (go figure) pulls up the driveway with Casey sitting in the back seat.

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Do you want to share, Mummy?????

There is a back road into town that runs through the forest behind our house and this lady and her son were out for a drive when they saw the boys. They said they really had to coax Casey into the car, that he looked kind of scared and that he kept looking back towards the trees… right, that’s because he probably heard us calling him and he’d never been in a car before. Trucks only.

Casey’s big adventures.

(Along those lines, when you see dogs in the middle of nowhere, they are probably closer to their home/farm than you think.)

Oh, Muldy!

Our ginger ragamuffin Special Agent Fox Mulder Fyfe sometimes would disappear in Bismarck. We figured he had a poker game and dancing girls going on down the then-dirt road leading to the farm.

One time he came back I let him inside and was instantly overpowered by the smell…

“Hon, I think he’s been right by some fireworks! He’s all smoky!” I thought…

“That’s not smoke, Tan. He’s been skunked!” (Alistair and I have very different senses of smell but he was right and Muldy spent a few days in the garage.) Bathing cats isn’t a lot of fun, either.

HRH Sport Fyfe

Then there is our stuck-up Siamese, Sport. He’s declawed and hoity toity, therefore he’s never been a hunter. He has tried to learn the ropes, though, often following Mulder around inside and out.

One day Whitney was looking out our kitchen window and asked me what the heck Sport was doing… running around the entire (big) house at least three times with something in his mouth.

He’d caught a mouse!

Only… it was a dead mouse… Mulder had caught it that morning. I watched him toy with it and then leave it beneath the camper where Sport had been investigating. Atta boy, Sporto.

Harry in his element.

Then there was Harry who may have had some wolf in him. Our loyal, handsome, somewhat-quirky boy used to come to elementary school or daycare talks I would do because he was so unique looking and just plain cool!

But he never really learned normal dog behaviors (which is fine on the Fyfe Farm. Just donate your reproductive organs and get along).

So when the daycare kids left the door open to their soccer fields in downtown Bismarck one summer, Harry decided show and tell was over. Outside is better than inside when you’re a wolf-dog, right?

Harry and Alistair had a very special bond.

I probably would have been fine on my own but when the kids realized the situation they all decided to “help”.

Imagine about 40 little kids chasing behind me waving their chubby little arms in the air squealing, “HARRRRRRRRRYYYYYY”. Harry glanced back and picked up the pace. Again. And again until finally one of the teachers got the kids to hold back.

2 hours.

I spent 2 hours sitting in a nearby neighborhood waiting for Harry to cross the street from underneath the tree he’d found to hide under.

Quite the creature.

What brought a lot of this up in my mind was Loki’s latest adventure a couple of mornings ago.

In the space of 3 minutes she disappeared on me. I let the 3 dogs out every morning and then go let the barn kitties out and quickly feed UB and Cleo. 3 minutes. I swear.

No Loki.

Here I am, Step Gammy!

I looked everywhere. Our front yard is a big, wide open area. I can see all over the place. I started calling and calling… that awful feeling in the pit of your stomach where something is very wrong….

Then I heard her little bark (it was actually her pissy bark, to be honest so I knew Little Miss Independence needed some help).

There she was standing in the middle of the creek. The snow banks are still 2 feet high, which is why I couldn’t see her. Thank goodness the water level and flow aren’t too high right now!

Loki needs her beauty sleep… especially after such a harrowing morning!

She was “chibbering” away but we warmed up by the woodstove and all is back to normal.

Which isn’t very normal at all around this place.

I could go on about Cleo and the UPS man or Casey knocking Dad over after knee surgery or Oscar bringing home bats, bunnies, & endangered birds or the ferrets vs the guinea pigs or UB vs the elk, UB vs the grizzly bear, UB vs the mama bear with 3 cubs, UB vs the bobcat and UB vs Georgia Woo Fang (who, thanks to that altercation is now just Georgia Woo) or discovering, as a veterinarian, that Phillipe was Phillipa or Dash not knowing how to pasture breed the 8 mares with their 8 foals or Casey splitting his head open on the snow plow blade or Gampy forgetting Loki when he was getting hay or Boomer getting locked in our closet when we went to Disneyland or Oscar & Cooper trying to have sex or UB piddling all over my clinic or a piddled-upon stove burner (aka Why Cartman Became a Barn Cat) or Jinxie going for a ride with the Schwan’s man, Whitney & Daddy when she accidentally moved to Montana ahead of schedule…. its endless mayhem and silliness.

“You can’t leave me, Matt! I love you!”

Well, future tales for many have, indeed ended.

I could choose to let that wash over me but I’m choosing instead to have a bit of a laugh yet again. As zany as many of our animal companions have been I would do it all again in a heartbeat. Without question or hesitation I would bring each and every one of them into the house and share our worlds on the prairies or in the mountains.

And we will love on those who remain with the biggest of hearts and all of the great food and meds-when-needed that we can provide.

And we will provide the kindest, most humane goodbyes when its time for that, too.

Thanks for coming along, Friends. This has been fun!

Alistair and his favorite redhead, Marmalade.

UB, always with the worried expression, looking slick in his new rain slicker a few years ago!

Our Trio of Trouble, Phillipa, Calypso & Luigi a couple of months ago

Alistair with Mouse & Jockey last winter

Oscar and Mummy many moons ago. He’s the reason I started this blog! xo

Bye, Bye Boomer

One week ago little Boomer took her last nap next to me before I helped her across the good old Rainbow Bridge.

Mummy & Boom, just a couple of years ago

She was the subject of one of my very first blogs two years ago when I was having difficulty managing her hyperthyroidism and kidney failure but we found the right mix of meds and she had a good run for most of that time.

Little Boomer a couple of months ago.

She had lost some weight and was becoming dehydrated (typical with older feline kidneys) so we started adding ice cubes to the water dish to encourage drinking. Most veterinarians will suggest the ice cube thing for older kitties. Cats are curious to the core and if they play with the cubes in the water to watch them move or to hear them tinkle they usually end up drinking more, if not at least licking off their wet paws. Looking back, we had just lost her brother, Oscar and perhaps depression played a role in her health as well.

The ice cubes became an addiction for Boomer. When we would first get to the kitchen in the mornings we were meowed at for the ice cubes.

When it was close to supper time-ish, more meows.

Ice cube junkie

The meows got louder and more demanding the more time passed but it was just one of those quirks we put up with because she was Boomer. And she was old and possibly starting to lose her marbles the past couple of months but still, the ice cubes weren’t a big deal.

We made little accommodations for our aging buddy because she had been a great cat for many years and it was easy to do.

Lots of expensive canned food to crush the pills in. More beds to lay around the house in. Watching wherever Loki went in hopes we could prevent her bonking into Boomer and possibly getting her eyes scratched (again). Combing her hair matts out when she reduced her personal grooming (and being watchful of those claws!)

More ice cubes for Boomer

We did these things and more and Boomer just kept ticking along, prancing into the hallway bathroom where the guinea pigs used to be and leaping up onto our bed for bacon in the mornings.

Until a few things changed…

She started to develop a weakness in her legs. If we would reach down for a good head rub it would almost knock her over. More vocalization, and louder. Incessant sometimes with an almost frustrated-sound to it. Even less grooming and even more sleeping and, a few weeks ago, dragging her back feet at night.

Our old ladies, Boomer & Cooper last spring

We shared glances at each other when she would just about topple over and we fed her treats on demand and her pills twice a day and she lost a bit more weight and became a lot more scruffy-looking and less tolerant and I had a long, teary chat with Boom-Boom and sometimes I had to check if she was still breathing and we had inner discussions and eventually out-loud conversations.

Which was when we decided it was Time.

Making the decision to end a long, good life is heavy. We agreed to do it last Saturday but we both avoided the topic, instead giving her little bits of chicken I cooked that night and suddenly it was Sunday. And we are health care providers who truly knew it was Time even though she didn’t have a terminal disease. Its not as if she was dying.

But she wasn’t really living, either.

Boomer never missed a chance to get into an open cupboard!

I wonder how heavy that decision is for bad people.

For people who make plans to end a person’s life. To separate the body from the soul for all of eternity, leaving a lifeless vessel behind. To stop the incredible machine that is the cardiovascular system from working its tremendous pump that keeps a body’s life force flowing.

I wonder if they struggle with the choice. Do they rationalize their way out of it for a week or two? Or do they plan to do it Saturday and then before long its already Sunday?

I appreciate that bad people who do horrible things like that have their wiring mixed up or they are under some sort of influence that they can’t control.

Or they are immune to the weight because of the volume of times they have made that choice.

Cooper, Boomer & Oscar a couple of years ago.

In our case, for all the right reasons, we sedated our 20 year old room-mate together and she quickly snuggled in next to me, resting her head on my leg as her last conscious act. Through tears and remarkably leathery skin I found the forearm vein that Alistair helped me hold off and just like that I stopped her heart and she looked at peace.

Oh, Boomer!

Saying goodbye to Boomer wasn’t necessarily easier than poor Mouse, who was young and healthy until he was suddenly gravely ill. It wasn’t easier than having to rush to Harry’s side by myself when his splenic tumor terminally ruptured. None of these has been easy. It will never be easy.

Boom and Coopie last spring. Not even bothering to pretend like they shouldn’t have been on the kitchen table. At least Boom’s reading material is acceptable.

But I can accept Boomer’s death more readily because she’s been on The List for 2 years and also because Alistair was with me and we made this decision together. For Boom.

And just like that we have 2 indoor cats and 2 barn kitties.

And there will be more changes in the weeks ahead because Calypso was diagnosed with his own cancer in November and each day truly is a gift.

Bonjour!

He continues to romp and play and eat like a fiend and steal Loki’s kibbles and Alistair’s boot insoles so his story is for another time.

I miss seeing Boomer in any of the beds scattered throughout the house and in a funny way I miss her caterwauling at me to add ice cubes to the water dish. I sometimes reach for her pills, forgetting there is nobody to give them to and I smile.

Her spirit is likely curled up somewhere with Cooper and Oscar and she isn’t dragging her little white feet and her eyes are bright and her haircoat is glorious once again. She’s grooming, prancing and enjoying a good sunbeam and although my heart is sad its kind of happy, too.

RIP, Boom-Boom. A good life deserved a good death.

Oscar & Boom….together from the womb for 18 years now reunited.

Just another day for Cooper, Boomer and Oscy

Love the look on Boomer’s face…”Seriously, you guys?”

A young Gareth and young Boomer… these 2 were pretty tight.

The 1-year old kitties with Alistair when we lived in Creston, BC. They had just transitioned to “inside” cats.

xoxo, Boomer & Oscar Fyfe

And We’re Off the Meds

Loki snooooooooze

We had an interesting couple of weeks.

More like, Loki had an interesting couple of weeks.

Or, one week specifically, when her veterinarian Step Gammy and her MD Gampy made the decision to put her on phenobarbital for seizure control.

I’ll back up a bit.

Last night at the dinner bowl checking to see where Calypso the ferret might be. He makes a point of stealing her kibbles one by one right under her nose.

The first seizure we witnessed was in August, in the truck driving to Montana from North Dakota. It lasted about 10 seconds and she piddled.

She had about 1 witnessed seizure a month since then and each one was the same.

Loki seemed to learn when one was coming because she would sit down by us beforehand. She has been more clingy with both of us as well and hasn’t liked being left alone anywhere in the house.

It might sound alarming but one seizure a month for a dog or cat isn’t a huge deal. Seizures themselves aren’t lethal (unless we’re talking about a toxicosis type of event). The danger lies in obstacles like stairs or falling objects or a prolonged event like status epilepticus or in aspiration if the pet vomits.

Snoozing in Bismarck in CP1a (Cute Position 1a).

In our case there weren’t any stairs and we have removed most threatening objects from the hallways because Loki is completely blind.

So we kept on keeping on and tried to keep her head up for the 10 second seizures because she did bring up a yellow bile-like frothy liquid each time and we would talk her through the events knowing that some humans who have had seizures say that hearing is the first thing to come back and we’d run her a bath afterwards and everything was alright.

I mean, sort of alright.

Older dogs don’t just “get” epilepsy.

Epilepsy is a young pet/person’s disease and Loki is 14.

“Did you just call me old, Step-Gammy?” (Loki, last winter).

So I have worried about a brain tumor lurking somewhere in her little round, kissable head but she has been otherwise fine.

Until she had 3 seizure events in one week and the last one lasted way too long.

Neither of us witnessed when it began, either but what we did see lasted about 20 seconds and she took about 1/2 an hour to get her balance back afterwards.

As a vet, when you tell me a story like this I will tell you about the amazing old drug, phenobarbital.

That it will likely cause some sedation and wooziness for the first couple of days but it usually passes and that it used to be dirt cheap and hopefully it will keep seizures from happening more than once a month and that humans generally have way fancier anti-seizure meds now but they used to use the very same drug all of the time.

I just happened to have some…

But it wasn’t an easy decision because Loki is blind.

I had to have a talk with my morals about this because, as her veterinarian, I am her voice.

But I’m also her Step-Gammy and my 2 worlds often collide.

Step-Gammy wants Loki here forever and the seizures to stop. She wants Loki to feel the warmth of springtime again along with grass beneath her paws instead of the snow. She wants to see this bossy little tyke run around our yard avoiding trees and bushes with a confidence ill-suited to her lack of vision. Step-Gammy thinks that last seizure frightened Loki as much as it did her.

“This is Bull Chit!” (a couple of weeks ago)

But Dr.Tanya Fyfe is concerned that we will dull her senses and her mind on phenobarb. And that Loki relies heavily on her sense of smell and diminishing sense of hearing and she’s concerned about that possible brain tumor and what the drug could do with that.

The vet in me wrestled a bit more but then decided we could at least try it at a very low dose and see.

The first low dose wasn’t low enough.

Talk about stoned.

Poor Loki was completely confused wandering our hallways, turning herself around and around and then figure-eighting and pin-balling her way through the foyer. She sat and licked Gampy’s bare foot for a full 15 minutes with deep, slow, full-tongue intensity.

“Did you just tell them about the foot thing, Step-Gammy?”

She barked at closed doors. Then at open doors. She stumbled and bumbled and definitely slept a lot more than we were comfortable with.

The second, lowered dose was less intense but she just wasn’t herself.

Alistair and I kept waiting for her body to become accustomed to the medication but even after a week it just didn’t happen.

Then she started going to the bathroom inside, which is definitely not a Loki-thing.

It was always on tile floors, thankfully, but cleaning pee and poop up every single day wasn’t cool for either of us.

Or for Loki.

snoozing peacefully on the Magic Blanket last night

It was time for Dr.Fyfe to have a word with Step-Gammy.

I always used to counsel my clients when we were discussing senior pets and any changes they noted and how the people actually felt about the changes.

It was significant for me when I would see tears creep into peoples’ eyes or I would hear their voice crack if they chose words like, ‘frustrated’, ‘angry’, ‘wrecking the carpets’ or ‘I know its not their fault but…’

I have always maintained that you don’t want your last weeks or months or time with your beloved animal companions to be filled with frustration and anger. Not only can the pets sense that and realize there has been a change, your memories of that time together will also bring back those feelings.

And that’s not what I want for any human-animal bond.

A couple of weeks ago, navigating the piddle path we’ve cleared for her.

Its not what I want for Loki.

Loki Fyfe, the sassy-pants, bossy, big-dog-trapped-in-a-little-dog, hairlipped, heart murmured, snoring, prancing, impatient, arm-licking, adorable love bug went off the phenobarbital.

She has always had tons of dignity and spending all day in a drug-induced stupor seemed to diminish that.

She’s in charge once again and is back to normal.

Sleeping on my feet as I type.

Loki and I in Bismarck this summer.

We haven’t witnessed any seizure activity since stopping the meds but we will.

And maybe her time with us won’t be for as long but it will be good time. Great time. Sassy-pants time. Quality time.

We owe her that much.

Helping Gampy model his awesome leather wrap this summer.

Loki loves a good back scratch & wiggle!

Our stylish grand-dog last winter!

Cuddles with Gampy, UB and Cleo in Bismarck this summer.

The First Sunrise of 1993

Happy New Year and welcome, 2016!

While 2015 was marvelous for so many reasons I am fine to shut the door behind it.

Not that the day of the week or the number on the calendar changes much.

View of the front yard.

Its still winter.

We’ve still got over 2 feet of snow on the ground.

The snowmobilers are racing around the meadows and the yurt-ski people are filling up the parking area at the end of one of our nicely plowed driveways and Alistair is still going back & forth to Bismarck and Loki has had a few more seizures.

Loki. Right now. Not seizing!

They aren’t very long- 10 seconds at the most.

I’m starting to notice a routine she has when they occur and maybe she seeks us out when she senses one coming on because I have been close by for the last 3.

She sits down or stands very still and then she starts bringing up a frothy bile-like foam (I’m not trying to gross you out. Its just what happens). Her medically-inclined Gampy and Step-Gammy think the pre-seizure phase is somehow making her nauseas.

Then the trembling starts.

Loki napping under the covers. Not having a seizure.

Twice now we have held onto her, stabilizing her with our own bodies and she doesn’t fall over and hasn’t actually gone into the full-blown seizure. Other times she goes down (gently if we are around to assist… thankfully she’s only 15 lbs) and she seizes.

Then she piddles.

Then she wakes up.

And after a little while of being held, talked to and what looks like a bit of general fuzziness she is back to business- eating, drinking, barking at closed doors, barking at the other side of the closed door, and prancing through the house like a little pin ball, gently bonking against a door here or a wall there.

Or a chiddy pat.

Boomer & Cooper back in May. When Boom was only 19.

Like Boomer.

Who, at 20 years old is pretty set in her ways.

I will say, she is still agile enough to make the effort to get out of Loki’s way now and she can still surprise the snot out of me with a rapid whack from her claws if I’m working on a hair matt.

BoomBoom gets twice a day methimazole for her over active thyroid. We’ve been at this for 2 years now. I didn’t think we’d last 2 months when we started.

But we did so we keep doing what we’re doing and another year has come and gone.

Beautiful New Year in our back yard in Montana!

I spent New Year’s alone (well, void of human company) which isn’t all that bad. I made it to midnight and reached over to pet the dogs, wishing them a happy New Year!

I got a couple of tail thumps from UB but that was about it.

Are you writing about me, Mummy?

Its not the first New Year’s I’ve ever spent alone.

The first one was saying goodbye to 1992 as 1993 came along.

I was living in Tokyo (Chiba, really), Japan and working as an English teacher for American Language Schools.

Me with some of my students… and Rhonda. Who will have her own story someday.

I was overweight, pale, engaged to the wrong man back in Canada, living within 2 tiny rooms in a cement block that was partly inhabited by the Yakuza, drinking too much Kahlua and cream at night, without internet, writing lots of letters, living for my cassette tape player and I had no clear idea of what I wanted out of life.

Thankfully a cousin who lived there introduced me to one of her students, Mr.Katsumata, who took pity on this poor young Geigin who was alone for the holidays.

He began with what must have been an incredibly expensive supper on Christmas day- a day that isn’t celebrated in Japan like it is in more Christian-based countries.

Mr. Katsumata outside of Omote-Sando Dori in Tokyo.

I look like a white giant here but I assure you I have never been tall.

Mr.Katsumata also wanted to share a traditional Japanese New Year’s with me, which I have forever remembered and appreciated.

Boarding the train at 2am. We had seats in the 2nd row!

We took the first train of 1993 to the coastal city of Endo-Shima to watch the first sunrise of the year.

Its a pretty big deal in the Land of the Rising Sun.

It is tradition (and good luck!) to visit many temples and snack amongst the crowds before, during and after sunrise.

Visiting one of many temples sometime around 5am in Endo-Shima, Japan.

We made sure to get as close to the shore as we could and among hundreds of Japanese we watched the sun rise above the horizon on the first morning of 1993.

There it is! The first sunrise!

It was beautiful to see and be a part of. Everyone cheered and hugged and I felt pretty special looking out over the waters that morning many mornings ago.

We kept going around to temples and Mr.Katsumata taught me about various statues and beliefs and we ate too much food and drank beer or tea and before long I was back in my little rectangle of a house as one very tired Geigin.

Hundreds of people visiting all of the temples after the sunrise.

I learned a lot that special day and it still holds deep meaning for me. I wasn’t traveling to Japan as a tourist and I wasn’t there with a group of North American figure skaters sharing the experience.

I was living there, trying to figure my way around a non-touristy community, immersed in a culture very different from my own as an obvious wide-eyed, pale-skinned, chubby outsider and yet this one man invited me to share his customs and traditions in a spiritual setting with me.

It was important that he taught me these things and shared them with me and it was equally important for me to experience a mere fraction of what being Japanese was like.

More temples on Jan.1st… excuse the crabby look on my face! I remember feeling really tired right about then but I got my game face back later on.

I’ve never seen the first sunrise on the first day of any new year ever since. I don’t think it would be quite the same.

There is much more to my adventures in Japan but I am smiling and feeling nostalgic and I need to work on our snow-shoe trail with UB and Cleopatra now.

I will leave you with the 3 ferrets and I with our latest Sing-Song saddle video we cooked up the other night.

Welcome, 2016. I still don’t know exactly what path I am on but I am enjoying the trail.

Working on the snow shoe trail this afternoon!

Come on, Mummy!

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